Portal 2

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

Anyone playing Portal 2? It has a nifty cooperative campaign that perhaps we can try with any sibling.

[Griffin NoName]

I am hopeless at flying!

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Never heard of it-- what is it?

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

Never heard of Portal? It's a puzzle game in first person made by the same guys from Half Life. You have a portal gun that literally opens a portal between two places.
[youtube=585,350]TluRVBhmf8w[/youtube]
The second iteration has even more tools but if you haven't played the first (and are intrigued) you should.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Oh... my.

That's certainly twisted.   Would take some serious getting used to.

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

I think I have an extra copy in Steam I could give you if interested.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Thanks, but I'll see what I can do from this end.

Looks like it came in the "orange box", but I already had a copy of Half-Life 2*, so I'm unlikely to want to get another orange-box.

I can't imagine Portal 1 would be that expensive by itself.


Edit:  Okay, I finally managed to locate Portal 1, it's $10US, and the orange box is $20, and apparently includes both Portal 1, and an episode of HL2 that I haven't played...

... the only fly in this ointment?

Apparently you must install their spyware/bloatware, STEAM... which I once had to re-install Windoze due to this giant resource-hog.  Of course, that was a long time ago, and maybe they've fixed it?  Hmmm... seems unlikely... I'm loath to experiment at this time.

Maybe later, when I'm through with the construction phase (which too-often makes for 10 hour days).

I'll check back here, later when things calm down at work, and I can afford to re-install Windoze if I need to.

*sigh*





_____________

* And played through but 2 times-- just not my cuppa, although I played the original 20-30 times or more... I really ought to get it out again, now that I have my new quad-core & Radeon HD 6800 graphics-- might be smoother this time around.  But I felt the keyboard controls were greasy-- a bad port from the stupid world of console-controllers, which I loathe.  And the vehicle sequence to me was an unmitigated disaster... it was so bad, that I played that sequence both times in god-mode... now that I recall, that is why I did not like HL2.   And it was too short...

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

I actually like Steam (the whole where is your master disk to run a game gets tiresome), and I don't run it unless I want to play, I don't let it be eating memory all the time. About HL2 I can tell you that it wasn't a port, in fact it was the other way around, console versions came out after the games for PC. With the episodes they started releasing for all platforms at the same time, but the engine was designed for the PC first. BTW I didn't get the orange box either, although I'm not a big online player (Team Fortress) so I guess it didn't make a difference.

Anyway, let me know because I do have an extra copy of Portal 1 and one of Bioshock 1 that I can give using Steam.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Thank you for the offer.

I've been thinking about it, and you're right:  I probability over-react to STEAM.   But I refuse to have apple products for much the same reason:  I loathe Itunes, and without ITunes, apple products are just bricks...

... and I must remember STEAM is not an apple product...

... meh ...

On the fourth hand?  For a measly $20, I can re-play HL2, and play HL2, epi 2 which I apparently missed, and I get a copy of Portal 1.  That's a lot of entertainment for a pair of 10's... I've certainly spent more for less.

Besides:  I can always GOD mode the parts I don't like.  

Finally?

I have a personal policy:  support those games I really like, by actually purchasing them.   I really liked HL1-- more than QUAKE, actually.  About the same as UNreal.  (pity about UR2 being so short, and not selling very well-- likely as not, no UR3 in the works...)

So if I decide to play, the Orange Box is the best dealieo.  

Unfortunately for all this?

My new Dell Streak 7 (wifi only) came yesterday....

... and I've discovered the 'crack' known as "angry birds"...



I'll get back to this (portal) I promise.

Really.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

(new post to activate the notification feature)

Okay, I installed STEAM, and so far, no problems-- apparently they fixed the memory-hog, mandatory memory-resident issue with it.  Imagine that?

(but, alas.... the stupid software does not actually exit when you close it-- you must go to task manager and manually stop the process... ((^{_{arrogant, lazy-~ssed programmers}}))... as if their magical, mystical software was the be-all and end-all of software I must keep running on my pc.... clearly, they have taken lessons from CrApple products.... ((obscure South Park reference)) )

Next, I purchased the Orange Box-- and how about that?  It politely informed me I had duplicate software licenses-- it remembered that I had purchased and registered HL2 a couple of years ago.   And it offered to let me give away the duplicate licenses!  I may just have to do that.... why not?

But only after a severely and unnecessarily complex re-activation of my log-in-- even though I had preserved my ID & password in SplashID... (^{_{stupid lazy-~ssed programmer-wannabes...}}) ...

*sigh*

Then came the massively slow download.... approximately 5 hours later, I had the Portal 1 game ready to go.  Apparently, they throttle the downloads, even though I just purchased it...?  

To the developers of STEAM:  do not take customer service advice from AT&T ... seriously.  Don't.

So, eventually, I'll get the rest of my Orange Box purchase, but only when I'm not here to wait on the massively slow STEAM portal's massively throttled download.  

meh

.........................

I have played PORTAL 1 up through level 16, by which time my coffee is ready.    I'll re-play the last one again, just for fun and practice.

But I love the fact that I can max-out all the settings, and the game is flawlessly smooth.... happy-happy-joy-joy!  I finally see the fruits of my $$ upgrade.  

Give me some more time to re-hone my skillz at this game, and I'll look at Portal 2...

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

You don't need to use the task manager to kill steam, just do a right click on the icon on the notification area and exit. As for throttling I haven't experienced it, in fact lately they frequently take all my bandwidth while downloading, now, consider that each game usually takes a few Gigs so it will never be instantaneous. AFAIK they even have a download method similar to what the torrents do, but it will depend on who has a low ping from your location that actually has the program installed.

GlaD(OS) you're enjoying Portal. ^__^